Do kids from the city like mountain gorillas?
Have they visited the park where golden monkeys live?
Do they ever see forest elephants in their back yard?

A few months ago, I received an email from Sophia Milosevic Bijleveld - she and her husband live in Kigali, Rwanda’s captial city which is approximately a 2 hour drive from where I live in the Northern Province and Parc National des Volcans where the mountain gorillas live. I was thrilled to learn more about her work at the Kandt House Museum of Natural History in Kigali and pleased that she was interested in learning more about our project.

Click here to see a photo of Richard Kandt’s house that is now the Natural History Museum and more information provided by the Institute of National Museums of Rwanda.

Conversations with Sophia were refreshing and we started planning for art from Art of Conservation students in the north to be brought down to the city for an exhibition. Sophia received final approval from the director of the Institute of National Museums, Professor KANIMBA and a date was set.

Team AoC loaded the trucks with art - art made from students from the classes we just finished - and once we arrived in Kigali we got busy hanging the work at the museum.

Sophia contacted schools in Kigali and arranged for field trips to the museum. Here, Valerie and Sophia with a group of school children discussing the lesson Nzeli and the Flying Dart: Dr. Lucy Tells a Story.

Fahad, at the far right, speaks with students visiting the museum from APACOPE (Association des Parents pour la Contribution a la Promotion de l’Education).

Above, Eric and students look at watercolors - Animals of the Virunga Forest: gorilla, golden monkey, forest elephant, and forest buffalo.

Sophia, Valerie, Eric and Fahad received many interesting questions from the children.
Here are a few:
1. Do gorillas eat bananas?
2. How do gorillas form their families?
3. How do they get to know each other?
4. Do they breast-feed?
5. Does HIV/AIDS come from gorillas?
6. Do gorillas have boundaries? Aren’t there gorillas in Congo and Uganda?
7. People say we come from gorillas? Why do gorillas still exist?
8. Between humans and gorillas, who appeared on the planet before the other?
9. What would happen if these animals no longer existed?

Some of the kids laughed when they learned that some of the drawings were made by adults and insisted they could draw better. Well, with the interactive sheets below, students soon had a chance to try for themselves.

After viewing and discussing the art, students drew gorillas, answered questions in their own words about conservation, and drew a sad and happy expression. Interactive sheet #1 in English and Kinyarwanda.

Here, we draw the body of a forest buffalo. Interactive sheet #2 in French.

Thank you Sophia, for giving us the opportunity to help bridge a gap between city streets and forests where the last remaining mountain gorillas inhabit.

Coming up next, more scenes from the Kigali.
Julie

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Thank you for the $200.00 donation, VIRGINIA!!! We can hardly wait for you and your students to come to Rwanda and work with AoC next spring! Thanks for everything you do!

Paula sent this comment to me after she saw the illustrations generated from our Where Do Gorillas Come From? exercise:
This is so beautiful. I wish you’d make a calendar with a selection of the best pictures - I’d buy one!

Theresa, Sherri S. and many more of you share similar interest in purchasing art made by our Art of Conservation students. I’m struggling with the logistics and perhaps you all can help me. The money raised would help generate funds for the project and thus allow Art of Conservation to continue reaching out to as many different communities located next to PNV. It is approximately $100.00 for one student to participate in our free three-month course. The blogs I am posting now represent the work of 150 students, equalling to approximate project costs of $15,000.00 per each three-month course. In a one-year period, AoC works directly and intimately with nearly 450 individuals.

If I design a set of notecards, a T-Shirt and calender with student’s art and also made available student’s original art that is in the dried banana leaf frame made by Alphonsinee, are you all interested in purchasing these things? Pricing, marketing, shipping, etc… needs to be sorted out. I look forward to hearing your comments and suggestions.
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Johnny Cash comes to class - well, at least through speakers connecting to my iPod. Joining him is Diana Ross, The Beatles, Burning Spear, Yo Yo Ma, Ladysmith Black Mombazo, Jimmy Cliff, Elton John, Beethoven and Yo La Tengo. I switch the music off and ask, “How do you feel?” Fine, good, happy are the responses from our class of 50 children.

Not that I want to ruin anyone’s day, but with our exercise today, LESSON IN ART CAPTURING FACIAL EXPRESSIONS, I want to explore a few more of our emotional states.

Mama Is Sad, a song by Justin Roberts, a native of Des Moines, Iowa where I grew up, conjures sadness. Luciano Pavarotti’s belting evokes curiosity. Giraffe from David S. Polansky’s Animal Alphabet Songs brings us back to happy. Ok, we’re acknowledging more human emotions. Good.

Now, I’m thinking, this song will really bring the house down with deep emotional expression - John Denver’s Calypso - his tribute to Jacques-Yves Cousteau and his oceanographic ship. Music is switched off…silence….then quietly someone says, “That’s terrible!” and with this the student’s laughter brings down the house. I laugh too, but come on, I love that song.

Clearly we are loosening up as kids rush to the front of the class and dance as Bob Marley wails on.

Settling back down in our seats, Eric, AoC’s lead art instructor, explains to the children the exercise:

Part 1. With a pencil, quickly draw a classmate’s face showing their HAPPY expression.
Continue with watercolors.

Part 2. With a pencil, draw a golden monkey or forest elephant’s face showing a HAPPY expression.
Continue with watercolors.

Below, photographs of kids getting started on Part 1 by looking at a classmate’s happy expression.

Classmates drawing each other’s HAPPY expression.

You lookin’ at me?

Again, looking at a classmate’s happy expression and quickly drawing to capture emotion on paper.

Their pictures from the day in the upcoming post.

Julie

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“Where do gorillas come from?” a student asks our guest speaker, a guide from the park service, (ORTPN). We hear a bit of nervous laughter and no further discussions. I ask myself, “Why?” It isn’t an easy question to tackle, to be sure. Should Team AoC avoid addressing this wonderful question which we receive from nearly every group we work with?

Valerie, Eric, Fahad, and I agree to design a basic interactive lesson about Earth, life, and the great apes, but first we need an evolution timeline crash course of our own! We read and receive help from Dr. Magdalena,
MGVP’s Regional Field Veterinarian. We also agree we need to keep it simple - filling in the spaces of evolutionary development over time. Preparing the students for the following week’s class, we ask them to consider three questions:
1. When was Planet Earth formed?
2. When did life first appear on Earth?
3. Where do gorillas come from?

The approximate time of Planet Earth’s formation seems to be a good place to start. In a previous post, I introduced you to Alphonsine, a Rwandan artist living near Parc National des Volcans, who makes all kinds of things from dried banana leaves. Alphonsine giggled as she walked away with our command of a big round ball, and yet she produced just what we were looking for, Planet Earth.

In the field near the classroom, we take a walk through time, beginning approximately 4.6 billion years ago. Kids meander about Planet Earth.

Stepping forward just a few steps, we stop at the Prokaryote approximately 4 billion years ago, suggesting the simple cell represents first signs of life on Earth.

Now a really big leap on our timeline and we jump to find the ORANGUTAN evolving in Asia approximately 8 million years ago. Volunteers help by wearing papier mache masks made by Eric and Fahad.

Weeks of planning and preparation for the exercise were quickly coming to an end. Valerie and I got somewhat nervous and wanted to see how the masks looked and if they would be ready. We were thrilled when we saw the 5 great ape faces drying in the sun at Fahad’s house. Valerie inspected further by testing the chimpanzee mask. The chimp is my favorite.

Six million years ago GORILLAS were evolving.

HUMINOID, what will become modern human, and CHIMPANZEES split on our evolutionary timeline.

BONOBO’S, Valerie’s favorite of the great apes, branched from CHIMPANZEES approximately 2 million years ago. Above is a photograph of Eric and an adult student from Shingiro.

And here we are, MODERN HUMANS - not a final stopping point, but where we are presently.

After our walk on the timeline, we head into the classroom.
Coming up next, our student’s oil pastel drawings illustrating WHERE DO GORILLAS COME FROM?

My dog Ibyiza helps Eric paint signs.

Julie

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Lesson Where Art Shows the POSITIVE Impact of People on the Environment

Art student’s express more views on how they think people can protect the environment as opposed to being destructive.

A photo of volcanoes resting inside a national forest while cultivation threatens to enter. A view from a classroom in Kinigi.

Drawing of a woman working in the fields.

Another picture of a woman tending to her crops, perhaps this is corn.

Figure planting a tree.

Holding a seedling.

Shingiro Art of Conservation class.

More again soon,
Julie

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Lesson Where Art Shows the NEGATIVE and POSITIVE Impact of People on the Environment.

Below is the final installment, for now, in our series of illustrations from our students showing what they believe to be destructive to our ecosystem. Here the students focus on hunting and setting snares to trap gorillas and other animals in the forest.

Warning! Life if not always a pretty picture.

Killing gorillas. Illustrations #1

Killing gorillas and other animals in the forest. Illustrations #2.

Setting snares and using guns in the forest. Illustrations #3.

Bow and arrows and machetes used to kill gorillas. Illustrations #4.

More illegal activity in the forest. Illustrations #5.

It is visually apparent our students are familiar with what may occur inside the forest, a place bordering on their homes and farms. It is our hope, Team AoC, that during classes we can foster a greater appreciation and awareness of the gorillas and environment not because we told our students they must, but because they choose to for reasons which resonate within. I’m feeling optimistic, especially with the children we work with, that a broader understanding is being recognized of why protecting our ecosystem is so important to us all.

Julie

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Three times a week, we load my truck with art supplies along with the prepared lesson of the day and drive up the hills to where we hold art classes - all of which are next to the gorilla park, Parc National des Volcans.

Our ‘art studio on wheels’ presently works with two classes of children and one class of adults. We are more than halfway through our three-month course now.

Guest visitors, Dr. Lucy, Dr. Magdalena, Jean de Dieu NGIRIRA, Odile NYIRAGUHIRWA, all of whom work in or around the park in various capacities, have helped Team AoC instill even greater awareness to our 150 students of the importance of preserving our natural resources, taking care of our own health, and protecting flora and fauna.

Below, watercolor illustrations following the theme of the day, “Lesson where art shows the NEGATIVE and POSITIVE impact of people on the environment.” We continue concentrating on the negative or destructive impacts. If you’re feeling a bit low or discourage by the art shown here, please be patient, soon we’ll present our student’s positive perspectives!

Illegally cutting trees. Illustration #1.

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Illegal activity in a Protected Area, such as hunting, poaching bamboo, and setting the forest on fire. Illustrations #2.

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More illegal activity inside Parc National des Volcans. Illustration #3.

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Hunting with bow, arrow and machete in the forest. Illustration #4.

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More fire in the forest. Illustrations #5.

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Rwanda has strict regulations for cutting any tree whether it is inside the forest or outside of the forest. Illustration #6.

Julie

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I just received notice of two donations from anonymous contributors, one on 1 May and the other on 9 May. Thank you very much! I truly appreciate your generosity.

sniffle, SNEEZE, cough, sniffle, sneeze, COUGH, sniffle, sniffle, cough, cough, SNIFFLE….

Our project, Art of Conservation, works directly with the people who are living next to a protected area, in this case, Parc National des Volcans. Our students practically live side by side with the endangered mountain gorilla.

Recently, Team AoC incorporated lessons emphasizing the importance of personal hygiene by encouraging students to form healthy daily habits. We know research shows there is strong evidence suggesting that many primate species are susceptible to many of the infections that people are afflicted with and that the transmission of infection can occur in both directions. We encourage a one-health approach to life and try our best to set examples for the students to follow.

Can we motivate our art students to better care for themselves which inevitably spirals to better health for their families, better health for their communities, their land, water, forest, gorillas and other animals and then back again?

A hanky may seem an insignificant item toward the efforts of one-health, but small steps can help.

STEP 1
Go to the local market to purchase panels of fabric.

Miscalculating the amount of fabric needed to make 150 rectangular-shaped hankies, Jacqueline, a member of AoC house staff, and I returned numerous times to the market asking the friendly woman pictured above if she could find more of that same fish design. She always tracked down more for us.

STEP 2
Call Jean de Dieu NGIRIRA, a previous Art of Conservation guest speaker and ORTPN staff member, and ask him how to get in touch with his wife, Jacqueline, who is a seamstress in Kinigi Town.

The connection is coordinated and I meet Jean de Dieu and Jacqueline at Jacqueline’s shop in Kinigi Town to discuss the order.

STEP 3
Jacqueline gets busy straight away at her foot pedal sewing machine.

Team AoC will give each student enrolled in our present program, 150 individuals, a hanky.

STEP 4 (Optional)
Give everyone else you know a hanky.

AoC house staff, Muzehe, Phocas, and Jacqueline, decide it best to carry their hankies on their head. Additionally, they prepare my two dogs for their morning walk.